After a century of struggle, Native Americans are retrieving their rights and their heritage to preserve an ancient culture from extinction

The temperature was 21 degrees below zero, not counting the 20-m.p.h. winds blowing across the hilltop cemetery, as mourners gathered to remember a gruesome massacre. A century ago, on Dec. 29, 1890, soldiers of the 7th Cavalry slaughtered hundreds of Sioux men, women and children who had sought refuge under a white flag at a place called Wounded Knee. To mark the anniversary, descendants of the survivors came on foot and on horseback, some from hundreds of miles across the plains. They circled the chain-link fence around the grave site, saying their prayers in silence and burning sage for purification. South...